


Perhaps overly so

by Keenir



Category: Die Hard (1988 1990 1995 2007)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-15
Updated: 2010-02-15
Packaged: 2017-10-07 06:46:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/62490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keenir/pseuds/Keenir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elaborate plan, check.  Making it end well, working on it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perhaps overly so

**Author's Note:**

  * For [missyvortexdv (Purpleyin)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Purpleyin/gifts).



> Note: Taylor was one of the head FBI agents in _Live Free Or Die Hard_ and was portrayed by actress Christina Chang.
> 
>  
> 
> Prompt: older, bitter and twisted after a failed relationship with Lucy, Matt finds himself the villain of the piece once more.  
> Written for: Missyvortexdv in the bb_and_ww Anti Valentines fic exchange  
> Note: sorry, but I couldn't get the "bitter" in.

"Ah," Farrel said, taking a seat at the bar. "Found you."

"I've been right here," Taylor replied.

"Right," he said, opening his briefcase. "I'm _really_ sorry about what I said the last time we met."

"I've been called worse," was all she said, just before downing her ginger ale.

"Doesn't make what I said any better."

'True," Taylor said before he could ramble on and on like some people had done in her earshot.

Farrell made a note on one of his e-pads before returning his attention to her, and saying, "I made_ agent,_ I don't know if you heard."

"Didn't hear. Congratulations, agent Farrell."

"And, flattered that I am that you remember me, still have to ask for your help."

"With what?" Taylor asked, her voice measured, her ears perked up a bit despite herself.

"I've put this through channels, but I figure I should be the one to ask you for your help on this case I've got."

"I'm listening," she said, figuring that it couldn't hurt to let the younger agent make his case – if nothing else, he needs the practice.

"It involves the guy we've been calling The Hornet."

_Somebody we wish was in the comics his name certainly belongs in,_ Taylor thought to herself. "What do you need my help with?"

"The short version of my explanation is this: John McClane."

**.*.*.*.**

All the requisitions, permits, and transfers cleared without any fuss, and Taylor found herself instructed by her superiors to work with Farrell and McClane. And_ that _necessitated _getting_ McClane.

"Well yippee ki yi yay," John McClane muttered when the three of them were sitting in his living room. "Why me?"

"The Hornet," Farrell said.

"Like a wasp? Who the hell names himself after a bug?"

"This is what he left at the scene of one of his crimes," Taylor said, handing McClane a folder. Inside was a pair of pages neatly cut out of a science magazine. The gist of the article was about a newly-discovered caste in many wasp species – a caste whose sole purpose was to hunt down and eat any eggs and larvae laid by worker wasps…their reward was to lay one or two eggs of their own, to continue the caste line.

"So why 'The Hornet'?" McClane asked.

"It's possible he avoids calling himself The Wasp because he isn't a WASP," Farrell said.

"Or he just doesn't like the word," McClane said.

Taylor nodded, feeling the same way.

"So," Farrell asked him, "feel like being a hero one more time?"

_ I ** knew ** I should've included in my definition of a hero, _ McClane thought to himself, _that a hero doesn't go searching for trouble. But I didn't, and some guys** do** do some pretty heroic stuff when they look for trouble._ "Sure, kid. One last time."

Lying on the table, its recipient trying to ignore it as long as possible, was a letter informing McClane that employer regulations meant the NYPD wouldn't be able to keep him on for very much longer. _ Ouch,_ Janet thought to herself, knowing how her own dad had taken that sort of a send-off.

As they were standing up to go to the door – unless McClane had a stash of supplies he wanted to hit first – McClane said to Taylor, "We've met," nodding. "Not sure I caught your name."

"I doubt it," Taylor said. "I'm agent Janice Mai Taylor."

"Mai?" rubbing his jaw at the memory.

Taylor nodded, not backing down. "I've encountered some nasty guys named John."

McClane nodded, accepting that as a fair comeback and a good point. To Farrell, "When do we leave?"

"Well, there's right now if th-" and stopped because his cell phone rang. "Hold on," he asked them and answered his phone. "What? Oh come on, you're kidding me – no, I guess not. Okay," and hung up. Pocketing his phone, he looked to McClane and Taylor, and told them, "Sorry, guys, I was really hoping this would be the three of us against the Hornet and his gang, but…" and sighed. "I'll finish up fast as I can, and meet up with you inside, okay?"

"Sure, kid," McClane said.

**.*.*.*.**

If there had ever been any wallpaper or a normal-looking wall here, it had been ripped away at some point, because there was nothing but steel bars and rivets visible when John McClane arrived. The door itself looked like it belonged in some submarine movie, all jutting double-sheets of painted metal with a circular knob in the center. _ Okay, so not a perfect lift from a sub movie._&lt;

He studied the wall from where he stood, his left leg hurting from all the walking, and saw no way around it:_ No way to kick it open or shoulder it – gotta turn the knob. And soon as I do that, they're gonna know I'm here, and they're gonna be turning their guns my way._

He looked at Taylor, who had reached the same conclusion he had – she nodded.

_Hell,_ and turned the knob, shoving the door open, and flattening himself against one panel of the doorframe, raised his gun, and –

"The hell?" McClane asked, seeing all the gunmen lying on the ground, already dead. Wisps of some chemical gas seeped down the ventilation shafts – heavier than air, it was sinking away.

_Still no firefight. What's this guy's plan, killing all his men before he's sure he's won? _And he knew there was only one way to find out: to continue onwards. Echoing his thoughts, Taylor said, "Hell."

_.*.*.*._

Further in, it was the same.

"This would be good news," Taylor said, "if it didn't make me nervous."

McClane nodded, knowing what she meant: "Who's still alive, further in?"

She nodded.

The hackers lay at their terminals, electrocuted in mid-stroke. The assassins had not fared any better against the showers in their suites. And every one of the spies was in bed and would never awaken. And all of them the crème of the crème of bad guys from across the globe.

With an inward chuckle, McClane wondered if Farrell knew about this. _ Looks like I'm not going to be as needed as I thought. Bastard's doing my job for me…doesn't make him any less of a bastard, though._

And onward they went.****

.*.*.*.

"I want you to wait here," McClane said to Taylor as they stood at the door to the walled-off control room. "Nine times out of ten, as soon as I go in a place like that, somebody comes out of hiding in a room like this, and tackles me or tries to kill me."__

Can't argue with that sort of reasoning, _Taylor thought to herself._ Born as it is out of the experiences that would've saves our bacon five times over today, if the killers hadn't already been dead. She nodded, and drew her service weapon, taking a position by the door while he charged inside.

Before John's eyes, the man sitting in front of the wall of computer monitors rotated his swivel chair so he could face the newly-arrived McClane.

"You? You're the Hornet?"

Farrell nodded, not standing up.

"This is your idea of being a hero? Because I'm pretty sure you got it backwards."

He shrugged. "No, John, I'm not like you," Farrell said, leaning forwards in his swivel chair. "I'm not waiting around for someone to show up for me to take down."

"So you arrange for them to work for you so you can kill them?"

"Simply put,_ yeah."_

"And you asked me to come here…what, thinking I'd join you?"

_Like_ that_ was gonna happen. Like you'd do something like that._ "Perish the thought," Farrell reassured him. "I asked you here so you would stop me."

"You want me to stop you," McClane repeated.

"Be a hero. The kind they'll do more than just pat your back for."

"So you did all this…so I'd get feted?"

"Not just for you, don't worry. I did it to prove I can."

Typical.

"But mostly, mostly, John, it was for all those families you told me about. You know, the ones in their homes, afraid. I'm making them safer."

"You're killing killers. Didn't they make a movie about that?"

"A tv series, at the least," Farrell said. "I'm stopping the people who haven't been stopped. I'm not asking for thanks or glory – not for me, anyway."

The sound of a gun's safety being switched off forestalled any question McClane would have asked. He turned his head just slightly, enough to see Taylor pointing her service weapon at Farrell's head.

"What, you're upset I didn't offer to collaborate with your office or any other Bureau?" Farrell asked calmly.

_Calmer than he should be _was John's thought.

"This way, you guys keep your hands clean, you can say with a straight face that this was all the work of an ex-black hat, and you only need give accomendations to two people."

"Us," McClane said._ Me and Janice._

"Exactly."

"You don't exactly sound like you're overjoyed," Taylor said.

Farrell shrugged. "It didn't matter how this ends…not since the moment the two of you stepped into this building. I knew both of you would come up here."

_After finding all your hirelings dead._

"You not planning on walking out of here?" McClane asked him.

Another shrug out of him. "Doesn't matter. As the masters say, my work here is done."

"Prison's probably your best option."

Farrell didn't look like he was eager to go or to avoid that destination.

"You got some dynamite or C4 in here?"

"That would be a danger to the two of you," Farrell said. "I did consider it, though – then I could ask you both to leave, and detonate this control room once the two of you were safely away."

"What the hell happened to you?" Taylor asked.

_I really need to get the full story out of Lucy, _John thought to himself.

"Lots of things. Ninety percent of them were after that fire sale the three of us met at. Wasn't anybody's fault…it just happened. Life ended this way for me."

John asked Janice, "You think anybody would sentence him to life in therapy?"

She bit her lip for a second as she thought, then answered, "We could make an inquiry. Couldn't hurt."

Farrell gave them a smile. "You guys. I'm fine, really. And I'm in full command of my faculties."

"Then you know what comes next," McClane asked him.

Farrell nodded.

"Okay-dokey," McClane said, shaking his head.

***.*.***

"He didn't," McClane said as he and Taylor hauled the unconscious Farrell out through the building's front doors.

"There's always a fight?" she asked.

"Usually before the entire plan gets laid out for my benefit."

"Ah. That was his mistake."

"That and underestimating us." _You did good in there._ "Any thoughts what's going to happen to the genius here?"

"He'll be sentenced, that's unavoidable," Taylor said. "Though I'm pretty confident that it'll weigh in his favor what he did – though not how he went about it."

"Figures."


End file.
